How We're Different
- We help our partners see behind the curtain to empower themselves. We believe that the vast majority of traditional investment products and services do not work in the interest of investors. Hidden agendas, conflicts of interest and obscured fees run rampant in the financial services industry. We educate our investors about the businesses in our partnerships, about the investment process and thus help make them empower themselves to take control of their own financial future.
- We eat our own cooking. As founders we invest our own savings in the partnerships we manage. We also educate our investors on how we are investing via monthly meetings, training sessions, and around the clock access.
- We are proud of the way we build our partnerships. We build and keep the partnerships small to ensure visibility of the activities and investments at all times. Partners also know all the other people in their partnerships and they can communicate amongst themselves. It is all open and based on ensuring you, the partner, are empowered and are in control.
- We are obsessed with saving money. Turning over every cents twice matters, especially when investing for the long-term. Our partnerships minimize costs. We make few trades and we pay as little commissions as possible. We perform a lot of tasks in-house to save us all a few more RAND. Every RAND we save you stays in your account and continues to compound for as long as you invest with us.
- We are like free-range chickens. When it comes to investing we are not boxed in. We follow a value investing philosophy and are not restricted by silly restraints like most other funds. For instance, many mutual funds can only invest in businesses of a certain size, industry or volume in order to be more easily sold by brokers. The number of shares a mutual fund can own in a certain business is also often subject to restriction. In contrast, our partnerships are “go-anywhere” partnerships, meaning we invest in the best, most undervalued companies regardless of where we might find them. As a result, our partnerships hold significantly fewer positions than the average mutual fund. Richland IPs currently holds stock in 4 to 10 businesses, while the average mutual fund owns shares in a 100 to 140 businesses. To quote Warren Buffett, how much sense does it really make to put money into your 73rd best idea?
- Nobody pulls our strings. We are an independent operation. We have no ties to any other companies. Our partners own the entire company. As much as we like any of our current vendors, we won’t hesitate to go elsewhere if we can find a better deal for our investors.
- We don't want all of your money. We’re not brokers or financial planners. You don’t need to transfer all of your worldly assets to us in order to become a partner. Unlike mutual funds, we like to know all of our partners personally. But you don’t need to spend hours organizing your financial life prior to joining us. We only provide one of all the possible financial services you might need – long-term investing. Any decisions about asset allocation or diversification are typically made before you partner with us. From our perspective, one of the best things about our focus is that our business model is scalable. We can easily manage relatively small amounts of money for many people who are invested the same way. We don’t need to rely on big accounts from just a few people. Some of our partners have invested a substantial portion of what they have ever saved with us. Others view their position with us as a piece of a larger diversified portfolio. We leave the ultimate decision of how much to invest with us entirely up to you. We’re also happy to talk to your planner or adviser with you to help you decide what’s best for your future.